It's an exciting year for soccer in the United States, ahead of the World Cup, which is expected to increase engagement and build fandom across the United States. With me now is the managing owner of Inter Miami, Jorge Mas, and also Cristina Junqueira, who is the co-founder of Nubank. And I understand Cristina, you have a big announcement to make here with Jorge.
That's true. Today, we're unveiling a phenomenal partnership that we have struck with Inter Miami. We're going to be naming their brand new state-of-the-art stadium here in Miami, which is a long-term commitment and investment in the city and in the sport, and also we're going to be on the back of their jersey starting this year, so we're now partners of Inter Miami.
Yes. Congratulations, Jorge. What does that mean to you?
Thank you all. First, it's an amazing partnership. You know, when we created Inter Miami, we wanted to be a global brand. It was always my dream and aspiration that when people think of football in the United States of America, they think of Inter Miami. You know, we've done amazing things. We have the best player in the world. We have the best-selling jersey on the planet. We're recognized globally as a top club now, and what we're doing in Miami now is transformational. We're going to be inaugurating our new stadium on April 4 of this year as part of the Miami Freedom Park development, which is going to be potentially the largest entertainment district in Miami, hotels, offices, restaurants, retail, a really transformational site for us. And most importantly, and I was born here in Miami, and it's going to be the billboard to our city. It's located right adjacent to Miami International Airport. It's the first thing that 65 million plus visitors will see when they get to Miami. And Miami is in an incredible renaissance now as a global city, so this is an amazing partnership, one that we are going to hopefully add value to Nubank as our new naming partner and part of our jersey, and that's what we strive for. You know, we want to add value to Nubank. From Inter Miami's perspective, we have tremendous affinity and synergy of both entrepreneurial entities and companies. We hit it off from day one, and most importantly, with their 131 million customers, something that Inter Miami, hopefully we have 131 million new Inter Miami fans and Nubank can tap into the fan base of Inter Miami, which is global in nature.
How much of that do you attribute to Lionel Messi?
Listen, Lionel Messi's signing has been significant. He's had a major impact on Inter Miami, on our brand, on football in the United States of America. You know, we stand before you here and we're the most valuable soccer club in the United States of America. Attributable to Lionel Messi, his impact has been immeasurable. You know, we see him filling stadiums. He's the most popular athlete in the United States of America, first a soccer player, first one to be the most popular athlete in this country, a foreigner, an Argentinian national. But Lionel Messi, he's a unicorn. He's one of a kind. Having him here in our club has been amazing for us since he signed here in the summer of 2023. Many people told me that it would be an impossible dream to bring the world's best player here, and we were able to do that. And you know, on the back of our jersey, it says 'Freedom to Dream.' We continue dreaming big. This partnership is part of that, breaking barriers and disrupting, and that's in our DNA.
How much opportunity do you think there is for an American audience, especially with the World Cup coming on board this summer, for Lionel Messi to really be an ambassador overall, not just for the sport of soccer here, but for Inter Miami in particular?
Well, listen, I think it's an amazing opportunity. You know, the league we play in, Major League Soccer, was a result of the World Cup in 1994 and a small group of men and women who took a gamble on building a professional sports league. You know, now we're here to make this league thrive. It's our aspiration that we be one of the top leagues in the world. We play a truly global sport. Our competition is other sports leagues in the United States of America, it's sports leagues outside of here. Having Lionel Messi here as the best player in the world as an ambassador for our sport, for Inter Miami, as I alluded to earlier, Messi's number 10 pink jersey in Inter Miami is the best-selling jersey on the planet. And I think that's just a testament for Inter Miami, for what we represent, for Lionel Messi's impact on the sport. He fills stadiums. You know, we opened our season this year at the Coliseum. It was the second-largest crowd in Major League Soccer history. You know, this upcoming weekend, he's going to be playing at where the Ravens play in Baltimore, it's going to be a full house. You know, we end up playing in NFL stadiums where Lionel Messi goes. There's been an amazing impact, and an amazing impact for us to be able to have partners like Nubank with us. You know, obviously, for a large part, because Lionel Messi is part of our club.
Let's talk a little bit about the investment here. Cristina, how much is the sponsorship deal with and the naming rights included between Nubank and Inter Miami?
We're currently not disclosing the figures of the deal. What we can say is, obviously, it's a relevant deal, one of the biggest historical deals in MLS, which goes along with being on the best-selling jersey in the world, as well as naming the brand new state-of-the-art stadium, the nicest stadium MLS is going to have by a mile. Yes, you know, so we're extremely excited, as Jorge said, not just about the stadium, because we're also going to be partners with the district, right? And we see a lot of potential, not only, of course, on the team, on the jersey, on the stadium, but also on the brand of Miami, right? Like Miami has become, to your point, such a phenomenal city that has been attracting so much wealth, so much business, so many people from within the United States, as well as from abroad. It's so well connected, right, like so many direct flights everywhere. So it's really an investment in this potential, not only in the sport and the team, but also the city.
I'm just curious, is the investment here really about South Florida and building the engagement among Floridians in South Florida, or do you have aspirations far beyond the state of Florida with this Nubank partnership?
So in our case, the way that we think about this is, as Jorge mentioned, Inter Miami is a global brand. It's a global franchise. Like one of the stories that I like to tell is like we were discussing this deal last year, and I was in Rome, in the Vatican, like in the middle of St. Peter's Basilica, and I see, like, this Korean family with three kids all wearing, you know, Miami jerseys. And, like, it doesn't get more global than that. And we're kicking off this year, like this international expansion phase for Nubank. So we're not only going to be entering the United States, but also expanding our reach into a lot more countries after that. So this is an investment in building a global brand alongside Inter Miami, which is a global brand in a sport that is growing, you know, a lot, tremendously in the United States, in a year that, as you've mentioned, the World Cup is going to be a big tailwind for everything that's going to be happening here. So it's really an investment way beyond South Florida, right? Like it's about building a global brand alongside another global brand and combining the fandom, right, like you know, the hundreds of millions of fans that Miami already has worldwide, with the fans, the customers that we have that we like to call fans, because they're really passionate about our brand and our products too.
This, and since we first met, it was all about trying to be innovative. How a sports team and a, you know, burgeoning, up-and-coming financial institution that's changing how people interact with the banking system, there is a significant amount of things that we're going to be able to cross-sell, to cross-promote, because we're not thinking... we don't... our only barriers are ourselves and our imagination. So I think you're going to see super innovative products of how a global sports team like Inter Miami and Nubank, which is a global entity, doing things that are different. You know, when myself and my partner, David Beckham, and my brother and we got together to build this club, you know, seven years ago, this was only an idea, and we've done things completely different. And again, it's how do we think big? How do we think innovatively? How do we do things that are significantly different? And you know, when you look at the financial metrics of Inter Miami and what we're doing, I think we've shown what's possible, you know, in terms of our revenue, our reach. So when we look at the partnership with Nubank, it is that, it's a partnership. It's how can we add value to the Nubank ecosystem? Because if we couldn't add value, you know, we weren't just selling naming rights to a stadium or a segment of our jersey. It's not about that. That is the commoditization of an asset value, and we're beyond that. It's how do we jointly, you know, build value for both of our entities and, you know, and we have, I think, really, really good ideas of how we're going to do that, and it's going to be an extremely successful partnership.
